


summer and smoke

by legdabs (scvlly)



Series: essence [1]
Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Teenagers, Fluff, M/M, i dunno how to tag still!!!!!! lol
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-13
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-04-19 12:15:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14237076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scvlly/pseuds/legdabs
Summary: june, 1966. phil is working in a seaside cafe when a pretty boy orders a cup of tea, on the hottest day of the year.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Historical note:**  
>  Homosexuality (between men) in Britain wasn’t legalised until 1967, and even then the age of consent between two men was 21. This wasn’t equalised until 2001.
> 
> In case you don't know, Oscar Wilde was a famous gay author/playwright, who was persecuted for his sexuality. De Profundis is a letter he wrote in prison, to his male lover. I promise this is relevant.
> 
> If you're not aware, I'm making a longer fic out of what was a one-shot, 'love is the end'. I'll talk more about this in the end notes but for now, know that if you haven't read that, you can absolutely go ahead and read this first. 'love is the end' is the end to this story. If you want to read it first, you can. If you want to wait until the rest is written, you can.
> 
> as ever, thank you to elizajane for your wonderful work on this. i love you.

* * *

 

 

 

> And something started in my soul,  
>  fever or forgotten wings,  
>  and I made my own way,  
>  deciphering  
>  that fire,  
>  and I wrote the first faint line,  
>  faint, without substance, pure  
>  nonsense,  
>  pure wisdom  
>  of someone who knows nothing,  
>  and I suddenly saw  
>  the heavens  
>  unfastened  
>  and open.
> 
> pablo neruda,  _poetry_

* * *

 

 

It starts in June, in a beachside cafe full of red-faced tourists on the hottest day of the year so far.

Phil never thought he’d be rushed off his feet within a week of starting this job, but here he is: his feet ache, his white shirt sleeves are rolled to the elbows, and the breeze coming off the sea is too weak to cool the air in the cafe made stifling by an abundance of bodies seeking refreshments. He stoops again and again to open the fridge door and serve lemonades and milkshakes to the seemingly endless queue of customers waiting before him; each time he does so, his sweat-damp hair falls out of its once-neat quiff and into his eyes. 

It makes him wish for an end to a summer that has barely begun. 

He hasn’t served a single hot drink all day - a welcome respite, and not unsurprising, given the heat - until a lanky boy with a head of curls in a shade of brown that compliments the warmth of his eyes leans against the counter, a dog-eared book tucked under his arm, and orders a cup of tea.

Phil raises an eyebrow slightly, but gets to work; boiling the kettle and setting out a small jug of milk and a bowl of sugar cubes on a tray. He fills the tea pot and sets it beside a cup and saucer and spoon, taking the money the boy hands to him, and watching as he takes the tray outside to a free table beside the door. 

Exactly _why_ his eyes felt the need to follow him and not any one of the other hundreds of people he’s served today, Phil can’t say. But as the rest of his shift drags on and the queue of customers never seems to relent, he finds himself drawn to watching the long body of the boy in a low-buttoned shirt, reclined with an elegance that doesn’t suit the plastic chair in which he sits, paperback in one hand, and a lit cigarette held loosely in the other.

 

* * *

 

By the time the late afternoon rolls around and the sinking sun is casting its rays through the glass front of the cafe, it’s finally quiet enough for Phil to make his way from behind the counter and out between the tables to stretch his legs.

The girl who has been busy clearing the tables - Anna, he thinks, though he’s not been properly introduced to her, so he’s not all too sure - offers to swap with him and serve for a while, and he accepts with a grateful smile. Even though his task is now to stack dirty plates and precariously balance bottles to carry them to the sink, it’s a welcome break from the six hours or so he’s spent serving holidaymakers, grumpy from the excessive heat, with overpriced lemonade and too-sweet cakes. 

He finds himself once more drawn to the boy who continues to sit outside, legs now propped on the other chair sat at his table, still engrossed in his book. Phil, without conscious intent, realises he’s passing the tall windows beside him time and again in his trips to clean tables; on each journey, he notices something else about the boy.

The slight curve to the end of his nose. The warm glow that the setting sun lends to his skin. The way his large hands hold his book between his thumb and little finger with ease.

Before he knows it, Phil’s outside with the excuse of cleaning the tables out there, even though Anna has already finished tidying most of them. He finds himself looking for things to fix - a table whose supporting beer mat has moved out from beneath one of the legs; another with far too many chairs around it - and it’s not until he reaches up to adjust a lop-sided umbrella and feels his shirt ride up a little from where it’s tucked into his slacks that he feels the burn of someone watching him from the direction of the cafe.

He looks away from his task to see that the boy, feet still up on a chair, has his eyes trained on him. And not just on him - on the slither of pale skin above his hips he knows must be exposed as he reaches up to the umbrella.

Phil freezes. He’s not sure what to do - should he make some kind of accusing eye contact? Or carry on as though he hasn’t noticed? The boy doesn’t seem to be embarrassed at being discovered; he’s made no effort to look away, and it’s clear by now that Phil has seen him. He pushes back his shoulders to bring his elbows to rest on the arms of the chair, and Phil thinks that the way his chest puffs up a little as he does so might just be some kind of subconscious posturing, a set challenge.

So Phil takes the option he’d not even considered to be available to him, the option he’d never ordinarily be brave enough to take, and stretches a little further, makes his shirt lift a little more. Surely they both know that there’s nothing more to be done with the umbrella; no real reason for him to be up on tip-toes with his arms above his head, busying himself with the insides of an oversized shelter from the summer sun. 

He does it anyway. The boy never drops his gaze.

 

* * *

 

It takes five minutes of deep breathing in the cool dimness of the kitchen, hands buried deep in scalding soapy water, for Phil to recover enough to go back outside. 

He doesn’t know what to think or feel, or even what anything that just happened meant. It scares him that his overwhelming emotion isn’t fear, but curiosity. There’s also a hint of something else that’s somewhat more unfamiliar, though not entirely foreign. He’s not quite ready to delve more into what that is. Not here, at least. Not yet.

When Phil finally gathers enough courage to face the world again - crossing the cafe, opening the door, and tidying the closest table to him - the boy doesn’t look up. In fact, he doesn’t seem to notice Phil’s presence at all. 

Phil sighs quietly as he works, a little confused at the disappointment he feels that he’d made a little more than he should have out of what had happened in his head. It’s not the first time he’s done so, but at least this time, there would be no consequences. This was a purely innocent misunderstanding.

He’s heading back to the door, passing the boy again, when he hears a low voice say, “Excuse me?”

_Fuck_ , Phil thinks, because even in his more hopeful thoughts, he hadn’t prepared what he would actually say. 

He turns, quickly-learned customer service smile plastered on already. “Can I help you?”

“How long are you open for?” The boy asks, folding the corner of a page in his book and setting it on the table. He sits a little straighter when he re-arranges himself in the chair, holds his head held a little higher. Phil’s once again drawn to the depth of his eyes, and tries not to stare too much.

“’Til six,” he says.

The boy checks his watch with a contemplative _hmmm_ and sits a little straighter in the chair . “Can I get another tea, please?”

“Sure,” Phil nods. “Same again?”

“If you wouldn’t mind.”

“Of course.”

Phil sets the glasses he’d collected on the tray with the boy’s tea apparatus before taking off the things he can leave on the table - the sugar, and the half-jug of milk still left. He sees the boy’s hand disappear into his pocket in his peripheral vision as he does so, and when he straightens up he’s being given a fist-full of change that he can already tell will cover the cost of the drink at least three times over.

“That’s way too much.” Phil holds his hand out and takes the cash, counting out the correct shillings and pence to return the rest to the boy, but he’s stopped by a hand, reaching over gently to close Phil’s fingers around the coins. 

Phil feels as though he should flinch at the contact and the burn it seems to push deep into his skin, but instead, the warmth freezes him. All he can do is lift his head, questioning with his eyes.

The boy is already smiling; Phil sees a deep dimple on either side of his face. 

“Keep the change,” he says, and takes his hand back. It rests casually atop the book, but Phil’s drawn to the movement, and for the first time sees what the boy has been so intently reading.

_De Profundis_ , by Oscar Wilde. 

Phil can’t help the way his eyebrows furrow at that, the confusion he feels running across his features.

Suddenly, everything about the boy feels very deliberate, his every action a calculated risk. It’s as though he knew Phil would follow his hand to the book, that Phil would know what it was about. As though it was a given that he would read enough into the implications of finding the boy’s eyes glued to his exposed skin, the deeper meaning to the boy reading Oscar Wilde. 

Again, Phil meets the boy’s eyes. His expression and posture now seem somewhat open and unguarded and hopeful, but quietly nervous. Phil gives him a small smile, and receives one in return that’s a little more confident, a little more wide.

He pockets the change and turns to pick up the tray he’s stacked, when the boy clears his throat. 

Phil pauses, an eyebrow raised.

“Your shirt’s still untucked,” the boy says nonchalantly, his earlier uncertainty having disappeared without a trace. He opens his book again and smooths out the crease he’d put into the page, but Phil doesn’t miss the way his lips quirk a little, and his eyes flicker to watch as Phil, blushing, hurriedly tucks it in.

 

* * *

 

After taking the boy his tea, Phil busies himself by tidying the kitchen area, out of sight of the few stragglers left in the cafe. 

It’s easier, he finds, to be alone but busy when his mind is racing like this; to ground himself in simple tasks so that his thoughts can’t carry him too far from himself. He doesn’t feel so on-show here - closed off in the staff-only kitchen, there are no customers to interrupt, to ask him for this or that, or to watch him from the corner of their eyes as he just tries to do his damn job.

He wonders despite himself if anyone had been paying attention to his interactions with the boy. He logically knows that there was nobody else sitting outside, nobody else close enough to see their exchange, but it doesn’t mean he can ignore the _what ifs?_ as they weave themselves into his thoughts.

Anna finds him a little while later as he stares absently into the opened fridge, and clears her throat to get his attention. He jumps, not unnoticeably; so deep in his own head that he hadn’t noticed her watching from the doorway at all.

“Hey,” she says, and he turns to face her. “There’s another fifteen minutes ’til we close, but there’s only that guy you took another tea to earlier left. I kind of have somewhere to be, so could you do me a favour and lock up?”

Phil thinks he’s probably staring at her dumbly, but forces his mind to process her request, and hopes his mouth can form a coherent reply.

“Uh, yeah, sure. No worries.”

“Thanks, man. Don’t forget the bolt on the back door, okay?”

“Sure,” Phil nods. He hopes he’ll remember.

“You in tomorrow?” she asks, sounding a little rushed as she hangs her apron up on the hook behind her. Phil gets the impression that she doesn’t really care about his answer.

“Should be.”

“ Great! I’ll see you then!” Anna gives him a wave, takes her bag, and hurries out of the front door.

Phil checks his watch as she leaves. It’s a little earlier than she’d said, but he supposes it’s easy enough to find something to do if there’s only one other person in the cafe.

It’s then that he remembers that the one other person is, of course, the boy from before. 

His stomach twists. It’s been difficult enough to be alone with his thoughts as they’ve whirled and changed this afternoon, never mind their cause. He closes the fridge and turns to lean against a countertop, his hands spread wide apart on its blessedly cold surface. 

Phil feels nervous. He knows he needs to let himself think, to feel whatever he’s feeling, or else he never will. He’ll bottle it all and carry on, and the never knowing will eat away at him relentlessly until he regrets this whole exchange for no other reason than the fact that he let it slip away.

He gives himself a few long moments to breathe before he lets down the walls he’s held up for so long, and finally lets himself think about what happens next. 

Phil knows he’s most worried about reading too much into the little things. He doesn’t do well with not knowing - he’d rather play it safe than make the assumption that yes, the boy _had_ meant something more with the way his eyes lingered on Phil’s exposed hips; that he _had_ deliberately brought attention to the book he was reading; that he _had_ looked happier, even relieved, when Phil smiled back at him. 

But then, what if they weren’t assumptions at all? Phil thinks about the way the boy had watched him; the way he’d sit a little taller and the way his eyes would follow his every move. That sense of deliberateness he’d felt earlier seems too strong, too certain to ignore - so much so that Phil half wonders if the boy had brought that very book along with him today already knowing that he’d find Phil, and that Phil would know exactly what to make of it.

Phil feels calmer listening to his gut, so he lets it run on. His every unhindered instinct seems to be a lot less cautious than he’s used to, but he finds it doesn’t scare him as he’s so used to. It helps that he realises that the boy has taken most of the dangerous steps, whilst most of his own have been taken in response. The bravest thing he’s done all day is reach a little higher for an umbrella, and give a pretty boy a smile. 

He thinks it might just be time to take the lead, if somehow he can muster up the courage to push a little more. It seems only fair when the boy has taken so many risks, however subtle they may appear to be from the outside. Phil’s still so, so afraid, but he tells himself he’s only allowed as long as it takes to tidy the inside of the cafe, before he _has_ to talk to the boy again. 

He glances into the cafe. As Anna had said, it’s empty now except for the boy, who still sits reading at a table outside.

Phil’s stomach flutters, no longer from fear, when he realises that the world around him that feels so stubborn and unwilling to let him try simply won’t be present in the conversation he’s about to have. 

It’s just him and the boy now, alone in the evening sun, and suddenly, Phil feels more than brave enough to try.

 

* * *

 

“Hey,” Phil says, shoulder leaning against the door. He’s trying to look calmer and more confident than he feels.

The boy looks up, and raises an eyebrow. 

“We close in a few minutes, just to let you know.”

“Ah, alright. I’m nearly finished with the tea so I can bring the cup in when I’m done, if you’d like?”

“It’s okay. I was actually going to ask if you’d like another.”

The boy frowns, though clearly more in confusion than in discomfort. “I thought you were closing?”

“We are,” Phil shrugs. It’s easier to say what he means and all that’s implicit in it, he finds, now that he’s more in control of the situation, of their conversation.

“Are you sure?” The boy doesn’t seem to know what to make of this offer, though he’s certainly not giving Phil any indication that he’s about to turn him down. 

“Yeah. I’m pretty thirsty myself, actually. Long shift.”

“I could tell. That queue never relented, did it?” The boy quirks his lips in sympathy, and Phil, on some level, recognises that perhaps the boy has been paying attention to _him_ this afternoon, too.

“I’ve never known it to be so busy,” Phil shakes his head. “I’ll be back in a sec.”

He turns to go back inside, to make the tea and take a few more long minutes to think through this latest interaction, when the boy calls out:

“What’s your name, by the way?” 

Phil looks back at him. “I’m Phil.”

“Hi, Phil,” the boy nods. “I’m Dan.”

“Hi, Dan.” _Dan._

“You should bring your drink and sit out here,” Dan says. 

Phil pauses, weighing the boy’s words, but for the first time all afternoon, it doesn’t take long for him to read between the lines. 

He smiles.

“I’d like that.”

 

* * *

 

Phil makes his way back outside a few minutes later. Everything’s cleaned up and put away; all he has left to do is wash the cup and tea pot he’s about to carry out to Dan, but that won’t take long before he leaves. He doesn’t want any distractions, nothing nagging away in his head - this time is for him, and he finally gets to experience it uninterrupted.

There are a couple of scones and a slice of chocolate cake left in the chilled counter display, so he puts all three on some plates with some jam and cream and adds them to the tray of tea, before grabbing himself a bottle of lemonade from the fridge. They’d only be thrown out in the morning, he reasons, and he thinks he deserves a drink after how hard he’s worked, and for being left to close up alone.

Phil takes the tray out to Dan, who makes as though to stand to help him with the door as he watches him struggle, but Phil tells him it’s okay and makes it outside without dropping a single thing.

“I hope you like scones,” Phil says as he sets the tray down and automatically starts to put the beverages onto the table, but like earlier, Dan stops him with a light touch; this time on his forearm.

“Let me?” he offers, and Phil hopes he’s not blushing too visibly as he folds himself into the seat opposite Dan’s. Dan smiles, setting their drinks close to each of them, leaving the cakes in the middle, and reaching back to sit the tray on a nearby table. “I do like scones, by the way. Thank you.”

Phil sits back for a moment, giving Dan a small smile in response. It’s strange that not replying verbally doesn’t make this situation feel tense or too-quiet, but Phil supposes it’s a good kind of strange. 

He lets himself look at Dan - _really_ look at him - though not, he hopes, in a way that seems too analytical or cold. Phil’s eyes flicker from the curls atop his head, down to his somehow incredibly expressive eyebrows and those eyes whose draw he just can’t seem to resist. Dan’s cheekbones aren’t as high or prominent as his own but his jaw is somewhat more defined, and though he can’t see them now, Phil remembers that he has two deep dimples on either side of his face when he smiles widely enough. 

Dan’s not unaware that Phil’s looking at him, of course. He watches him back with a similar curiosity, following Phil’s gaze as it crosses his features and is drawn, instantly, when Dan dampens his lips with the tip of his tongue. Dan smirks, pulling his bottom lip a little way between his teeth and Phil, eyes still fixed on his mouth, has to shake his head to force himself to look away, to meet Dan’s eyes. He finds no judgement or mocking in them; only a soft intrigue that he supposes is mirrored in his own. His heart still races, but he’s quickly learning that it doesn’t take much reassurance from Dan for its speed to be from something a long way from fear.

Phil decides to take a sip of lemonade before he says anything else, reaching for the key chain at his belt on which he has a bottle opener. He leaves the lid on the table and lifts the glass bottle to his lips, enjoying the coolness of the drink despite the slightly too-lemony taste. 

He doesn’t realise that he’s closed his eyes, but when he eventually opens them - neck still tilted back a little way, the bottle still at his lips - he sees Dan watching him with the same intensity as earlier, and at this proximity, he can see that his eyes are almost completely black.

Phil takes another sip, watching as Dan’s eyes follow the long lines of his throat and the sway of his Adam’s apple as he swallows. Setting the bottle back on the table, Phil smiles to himself, and looks Dan in the eye.

“Shall I cut the scones?” Phil says, even surprising himself with the deepness of his voice. 

Dan blinks, clearly needing a moment to process something, before nodding. He watches, focused as ever, as Phil cuts open the scones a little jaggedly, his hands shaky under Dan’s intense gaze. He slides the first towards Dan, and keeps the second for himself. 

“Do you have jam with cream?” Phil asks. 

“Yeah. You?”

“I only like jam,” Phil shrugs. “Do you want the knife first?”

“It’s okay. Put your jam on first so it doesn’t have to touch the cream.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course,” Dan smiles, and those dimples make a reappearance.

“Thanks.”

“Anytime.”

Phil looks up at that, a little startled at the implication despite its offhandedness, but he finds the only thing he can do is smile over at him, a little too widely.

He gets back to spreading the jam, then passes the knife over to Dan, who uses the rest of both the jam and cream on his own scones. 

They take their first bite at the same time, eyes meeting across the table. Phil feels a little awkward when a bit of jam sticks to his bottom lip, but when he sees Dan’s gaze flicker to watch his tongue dart out to pull it back into his mouth, that awkwardness fades to something different, something _more_.

“Have you ever actually had a scone with cream and jam?” Dan asks him around a large bite of scone. 

Phil shakes his head, finishing his own mouthful. “I don’t like jam and butter, so I always figured jam and cream would be the same.”

“It’s not. I don’t like jam and butter either, but jam and cream is _so_ much better,” Dan enthuses. “Do you wanna try?”

Phil’s surprised, but manages to stop his jaw from physically dropping open. 

“Oh. Thank you, Dan, but really, it’s okay, it’s your scone…” Phil hears himself getting more and more flustered, and he doesn’t know why, or how to stop himself from talking. It’s not like he’s never shared food with anyone before, but somehow this feels different, something else that’s imbued with deeper meaning. 

“You can if you want to, Phil,” Dan says softly, as though he knows what’s going on inside Phil’s head, as though he knows just how to calm him down. “I don’t mind.”

Phil pauses for a moment, then remembers his promise to himself: that he would be brave. So he says: “Actually, yeah. Could I?”

Dan lifts his scone, reaching across the table. Phil expects himself to take it in his own hand but instead, his upper body just keeps moving, and he takes a bite out of the scone as Dan holds it before his mouth. 

“Good?” Dan asks, unfazed, as Phil licks his lips and lets out a low _mmm_ that he can’t quite control for seemingly more reasons than one. There’s something about the sweetness of the jam and the weight of the rich cream on his tongue that has his eyes closing of their own volition, and he’s very glad he decided to try it.

“Really good,” Phil sounds as genuinely surprised as he feels. “You were right.”

“I’m glad you agree,” Dan laughs gently. “I’m happy to have helped shape your future scone topping preferences.”

Phil laughs with him, taking another drink. He can’t quite help but feel that there’s something a little more important than his future relationship with jam and cream being discussed here, but he feels a little too delirious to deal with that right now.  

* * *

  

An hour and a half later, their drinks are long gone, and the sun is well on its way to setting. There’s been hardly a moment’s silence except for the lull in conversation after Dan had asked if Phil would mind if he smoked. Phil had told him he wouldn’t mind at all, turned down an offered cigarette, and watched contentedly as Dan brought the filter time and again to his full lips. 

“Do you want the chocolate cake?” Phil asks, drawing Dan’s attention away from the rolling sea creeping slowly up the beach.

“We can share it?” Dan suggests.

Phil nods, moving the plate so it sits more centrally between them, before he remembers: “Shit. There’s only one fork.”

Dan looks at him, head inclined, with an expression that clearly says, _so?_ Phil doesn’t respond - he doesn’t know how to - only stares back a little forlornly. For a moment, Phil contemplates getting up and retrieving a second one, but then Dan picks up the fork, takes a piece of cake, and reaches across the table to feed it to Phil. He opens his mouth without thought and eats it, then watches as Dan, smiling somewhat absently, takes some for himself. 

Phil’s keenly aware that Dan’s lips are touching the same metal as his just did, but the other boy doesn’t seem at all fazed by this. In fact, he acts like it’s the most natural thing he’s ever done; returning the fork to the cake over and over to share the rest of the slice between them. 

With each mouthful Phil feels himself relaxing. Sharing a fork with Dan is easy, like somehow it’s the most natural thing he’s ever done **,** so he lets himself _feel_ how right it is.He lets himself forget about the outside world, about the people who he can’t see and who aren’t here right now and what they might think. He tells himself it’s okay to feel like this, and he believes it. He even manages to go further, to convince himself that the way his skin felt when it burned under Dan’s light but unmistakably deliberate touches was okay, too. 

Phil doesn’t want them to finish the cake, because it feels as though without it, he has no excuse to stay. It’s irrational, he realises, because Dan doesn’t seem in any rush to leave, and it’s not like he’s needed any convincing so far to stay. He wonders how he can stretch out their time together, but all he can come up with is offering to walk Dan to his house.

“How are you getting home?” Phil finds himself asking, and Dan looks over with a shrug. 

“I walk everywhere,” he says. “I can’t drive, and my family can’t afford another car.”

Phil frowns in sympathy. “Is it far? Do you want a lift?”

“You _have_ a car?” Dan’s jaw drops, and Phil can’t help but giggle.

“Sure. I’m not from ‘round here, remember?” 

“Right, of course. The accent. A Manchester man.”

“Well remembered,” Phil teases. “Would you trust a northerner enough to get in a car with him?”

“Depends on his motives,” Dan smirks. Phil’s proud that this time, Dan’s comment doesn’t catch him off-guard. “Wouldn’t want to be killed in a stranger’s car, now, would I?"

“I might kill you if I drive badly enough, but I promise I’ll be careful with you.” Phil laughs, but there’s a serious weight to his words that he hopes Dan hears.

“It’s okay, Phil. I trust you,” Dan smiles, and with some effort, it seems, gets to his feet. 

Phil blinks hard once, then again, as he tries to process Dan’s casual admission. He can’t believe where they are just a few hours after meeting, that this other boy is so open with him, so willing to take such risks. Hell, he’s more than willing to get in Phil’s car, but after this afternoon and the mess of emotions he feels more than a little high on, Phil’s not entirely sure he can still remember how to drive. Phil doesn’t think he’s quite at Dan’s open admission of trust just yet - not comfortably, at least - but he wants to be. _God_ , does he want to be.

It takes a long moment before he can join him. Looking over, he realises they’re roughly the same height, though Dan might just have an inch or two on him, which Phil isn’t at all used to. It’s not a bad thing, though. 

He’s about to reach over for the tray, to replace the cutlery and plates they’ve used, when Dan clears his throat. Phil looks up and meets his eyes. 

“You’ve got…” Dan furrows his eyebrows, reaching across the metre or so between them to point to a spot close to Phil’s mouth. 

Phil doesn’t quite understand what he means.

“There’s a bit of chocolate cake,” Dan smiles, a little shyly, moving his hand a little closer, but not quite touching Phil’s skin. “Just… there.”

“Here?” Phil brushes his hand over his cheek. He doesn’t want to think about whether or not he deliberately missed the spot Dan was pointing to. For the first time in his life he feels like he doesn’t have to, so he just goes with it, lets himself flirt.

“No, it’s…” Dan’s still clearly hesitant, but there’s really not much closer he can get before he’ll be touching Phil. Phil realises that like before, he needs to be the one to take the lead.

“Would you get it for me?” he asks, as gently as he can manage, and Dan nods, curling in the knuckles of his fingers to sit them beneath Phil’s jaw, and swiping away the crumbs with the pad of his thumb.

“Thank you,” Phil smiles. His miraculously calm voice belies the tightness of his stomach and the way his heart feels close to bursting from its place beneath his ribs. Phil never expected that the touch of another boy would feel like this, so gentle and delicate against his heated skin. He never thought he would see the want he feels so intimately reflected in Dan’s eyes as they stare into his own. This moment doesn’t feel like it should belong to him - it’s too out of time to be happening here, between these two boys beside the sea, when they can’t so much as hold hands without the risk of being arrested. 

Phil wonders if it might just be worth it, though. Maybe he’d risk it to let himself feel like this again. He could give a little more, step by tiny step, if his reward was more of this. If he could turn his head a little to the side and lick the speck of chocolate from Dan’s thumb. If he could open his eyes to Dan’s deep brown ones just centimetres from his own. 

“Shall we wash up?” he asks, still smiling. It’s all he can think to say, to move his thoughts on from their fixation with the boy beside him who’s currently biting his lip in a manner that has Phil struggling to tear his gaze away.

Dan nods, and grins right back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> find me @legdabs on tumblr. i hope you enjoyed <3
> 
> usual pretentious note: title is from tennessee williams' play and i've obvs got some oscar wilde references in there u know me a big ol theatre gay. also pablo neruda bcos i lov him.
> 
> now. the important bit: what the Heck is going on with this?  
> basically, love is the end, the last fic i posted, is the end to this story. i've decided i wanted to write more in that universe, so i'm gonna write a backstory, but i can't do it as a chaptered fic because i've like... posted the end but i don't want to delete it. so this will be a series (called 'essence'), with each part being a chapter, if that makes sense. love is the end will be added to the series when i finish it, because it's how this story will end. after that, i'm planning on splitting the story into two post-love is the end endings - one of which will be happy, and the other... very much not. you'll see them when they're up, but they'll be in a different series. i'll explain more as i get closer to writing/posting :)  
> it's totally up to you, if you haven't read love is the end, whether you want to read it now, or wait until the rest is done. obviously, it spoils what happens, but i still think you can enjoy the 'prequels', as it were, if you already know how they end. similarly, if you don't want spoilers, don't read it until i add it to the series. you'll see it added when i'm finished, so you'll know when you can.  
> i hope that wasn't too confusing but honestly i'm confused but like if you have any questions please shoot me an ask on tumblr i promise i'm nice


	2. a car, a torch

It should feel strange, Phil thinks, to have another body beside him in his car. He’s not sure he’s had a passenger since his dad taught him to drive. It had been a with gentle instruction for the most part, but with the occasional raised voice whenever Phil tried, and failed, to parallel park.

It doesn’t feel strange, though. Dan catches his eye as they plug in their seatbelts and Phil feels himself smile over at him. It’s hot in the car from the day’s unrelenting sun, so Phil tells him, _You can open the window, if you want_ , and Dan does. The air that blows in smells like the sea and carries what Phil thinks must be Dan’s cologne, and if he takes a few particularly deep breaths - well. It’s just because it feels _right_.

“Have you ever driven before?” Phil asks, turning the key, and Dan shakes his head as the engine grumbles to life.

“We don’t have a car, and Dad won’t let me near the van because ‘if you crash it, we won’t eat until it’s fixed’.” Dan grimaces, making air quotes around his father’s words, before smirking across at Phil. “Feel free to teach me, though, if you’re feeling brave.”

Phil raises an eyebrow. “Maybe I will.”

“Don’t worry. I’m kidding,” Dan laughs. “I think the roads are probably better without me on them.”

“We actually can give it a go someday, if you want,” Phil offers. It registers on some level that he’s talking about the future, a future in which he and Dan are perhaps something like friends, when he doesn’t even know if they’ll speak again after today.

Dan looks at him, and Phil feels as though he’s being weighed up, considered, though not in a cold or discomforting way.

“Maybe. Someday.” Dan says. He sounds hopeful.  

Phil smiles at that. He puts the car into first, and they pull away.

 

* * *

 

They’ve been driving in a comfortable silence for around five minutes when Phil realises he has no idea where Dan lives, or where he’s supposed to be going. The coastal road to his aunt’s house, where he’s been living for the past week or so, is the only one around here that he really knows, and he’d turned onto it without second thought.

“Hey, Dan?” he asks, seeing the other boy turn towards him out of the corner of his eye. “Am I going the right way? I don’t know where you live.”

“Oh yeah,” Dan laughs, as though he’s surprised. “I forgot we’ve only just met.”

Phil raises an eyebrow at his teasing tone, but decides to play along. “Feel’s like we’ve been friends for years, huh?”

“Forever, maybe.”

Phil looks over at him. Dan’s grinning widely, but there’s a sincerity in his eyes that can’t be avoided, and Phil really hopes it’s reflected his own.

“We are on the right road, by the way,” Dan tells him, and Phil almost has to ask what he means, before he remembers his own initial question. “I’ll give you directions when you need them.”

Phil nods. A quiet falls again, and Phil lets his attention be drawn a little by the beauty of this flat landscape, so different to the rolling hills of the north that he’s used to. The setting sun casts the fields of wheat surrounding the road in muted golden tones, and lends a special kind of glimmering beauty to the usual grey of the sea beyond them. The warm lighting reminds him of how Dan’s skin had glowed in the sun outside the cafe, even before the height of the golden hour in which they now find themselves. It takes all of his strength not to look across to see the way the light and shadows play across Dan’s face here, in his car, because he somehow _knows_ he’ll find it impossible to look away.

Driving with Dan feels like a risk, though not in the way he’d expected it to. It’s not so much now that he’s worried about messing up or stalling in front of him, or even that he’s concerned by the presence of someone else in his car. Dan is a distraction, the best and most dangerous kind, and Phil knows he needs to start shutting down thoughts like that before he can’t escape from them, before he inevitably lets himself think too much about what he knows he’s not allowed to have - regardless of the signals that Dan may or may not have been giving him all afternoon.

 

* * *

 

“There’s a left turn coming up,” Dan says, leaning down to roll up his window a little way. “Say goodbye to the coast road, because it only gets uglier from here.”

Phil rolls his eyes, smiling. “Sure it does.”

“ _Everything’s_ ugly compared to this view, Phil. Tell me I’m wrong.”

He thinks he feels Dan’s eyes on him, as though he’s somehow part of ‘this view’, but that feels like a projection of his hopes than anything close to the truth.

“No, you’re right,” Phil chuckles, but blushes nonetheless.

He turns his indicator on, slowing the car for the sharp turn. As he looks to his left, he sees Dan already looking at him. Phil doesn’t miss the way his own heart skips a beat.

 

* * *

 

It turns out Dan lives on a residential street some way from the centre of his village, in a two-storey house with a white front door, covered in deteriorating render. It’s taken around twenty minutes to drive back along the winding road from the cafe, and Phil can’t help but wonder why Dan would go all that way just to sit by the beach.

“You walk this far?” He questions, but Dan shakes his head.

“I can get a bus, but I usually walk, though not along the road. It’s a lot more direct across the fields. Only a couple of miles. They keep saying they’re planning to build another road, to help with tourism and that, but they never do.”

Phil nods knowingly, indicating to pull the car over outside the house, but Dan reaches across and flicks the indicator off to stop him.

“Can you pull over, like, not outside? In case my parents ask questions, you know? They know I don’t know anyone with a car.”

“Of course,” Phil nods.

“I don’t mean that in a bad way,” Dan adds. “It’s not that I’m uncomfortable or anything, but-”

“Dan. It’s okay. I get it.” Phil interrupts gently, because it is, and he does. It’s nice, though, in a way, to hear Dan’s ramblings as he tries to reassure him that it’s nothing personal.

Dan gives him a somewhat shyer smile than usual. “Thanks, Phil.”

“’s alright.” Phil tells him, and pulls over a little way up the road instead.

When the car stops, Dan rolls his window the rest of the way up and reaches to unbuckle his seat belt. He takes a deep breath, looking over to Phil.

“Thank you for today,” Dan says, and Phil hears gratitude for more than the tea and cake and lift home he’d so readily offered.

“Thank _you,_ ” Phil smiles, and right now it’s enough to leave that ball in Dan’s court to interpret as he will.

Well, it’s almost enough. As Dan’s hand reaches for the door handle, Phil realises he doesn’t want to be left wondering what this is and what today has meant, so he digs his blunt nails into the steering wheel a little to gather the confidence to give voice to the question he really needs answered.

“Will I see you again?” He asks, but it feels almost too honest, so he adds: “In the cafe, I mean. Will you come back?”

Part of him expects to see Dan looking across at him with a raised eyebrow and a frown, but instead he’s met with what’s almost a smirk.

“You’ll see me,” Dan says. He brushes Phil’s hand on the gearstick with the back of his own as he reaches for the book at his feet, and unfolds himself from his seat. It feels deliberate, the contact and his slow movements. With Dan, Phil’s coming to realise that that’s the way things very often are.

Phil’s hand tingles as he watches him walk away, along the pavement, and up a cracked pathway to the door of his house. Dan gives him a small smile over his shoulder as he goes, and his somewhat cryptic words echo in Phil’s mind.

_You’ll see me._

It feels like a promise.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surprise! i'm chaptering this part! big lol. there'll be another chap to come before the next separate story in the series, so if u want u can like subscribe to this wee lad or keep an eye out on tungle teehee
> 
> hope u liked :)


	3. more than this

The next day, Phil arrives at work five minutes early, half expecting to see a long body leaning against the shutters pulled across the door. He feels a pang of disappointment deep in his stomach when he finds that Dan’s not there, even though there’s no real reason for him to be outside a cafe before it even opens, especially when it’s so far from his house.

It means nothing, and Phil tells himself as much as he opens the various locks and pulls back the shutters, but he’s never been someone able to let logic inform his emotions. He wishes that Dan’s easily-explained absence didn’t feel like such a crushing weight, that he could let himself rationalise the little things and believe them.

It doesn’t matter; he doesn’t have the time to dwell. He unlocks the door and makes his way into the cafe, heading straight behind the counter to brew himself a pot of strong coffee, before setting about wiping down the work surfaces around him - a job he’d entirely forgotten about last night.

_Last night._

The thought encourages a blush to creep across Phil’s cheeks, though more because of the words’ usual connotations than anything that actually happened. Although, something did happen, he supposes: something in the form of a boy whose legs seemed far too long for his body, with a sharp mind and soft-looking lips; both of which Phil would like to get to know better.

Phil hopes he’ll see him today, but forces himself to remember Dan’s parting words, so as not to let his hopes get too high.  

 _You’ll see me._ That promise, however vague, has to be enough.

 

* * *

 

Phil’s boss arrives not long after he’s opened up, bringing with her a request for coffee, and tray-loads of the day’s cakes and sandwiches to be set out in the refrigerated units beside the till.

It keeps Phil busy for longer than he’d anticipated it would; there’s too much food to all go out at once, so he finds himself in the kitchen, stacking and re-stacking goodies in the fridge and in a couple of cupboards, too, until finally, everything fits. By the time he makes it back behind the counter there’s already a queue forming, and his coffee is, of course, cold.

He sips it with a frown, catching his boss’ eye as she serves a glass of lemonade and laughs at his expression.

“Not enjoying your own coffee?”

“It’s already cold, Christina,” Phil sighs, before nodding at the empty cup beside the sink. “Was yours okay?”

“Mine was great, thank you, but I did drink it almost an hour ago.”

“Oh,” Phil laughs at himself, wondering absently where the _hell_ that much time had gone.

“Make yourself another,” she tells him with a smile. “I’ve got the till until you’re caffeinated.”

 

* * *

 

The morning passes in a busy haze, at a pace far faster than Phil had expected it to. By the time Christina is pressing his eleven o’clock coffee into his hand and insisting he take five minutes out to drink it, he realises his mind has hardly strayed away from his work: despite the way he’d consumed Phil’s every thought earlier, Dan and his absence have barely crossed Phil’s mind since he properly started work.

That all changes when - stood away from the counter, draining the dregs from his coffee cup - Phil looks up to see the boy himself stood in the short queue waiting to be served. Dan’s eyes are already fixed on him, as intense and dark as they had been yesterday, and Phil very nearly chokes on the last of his coffee.

He sets the empty cup aside, heading over to tell Christina he’s finished and can take over serving if she wants to take a breather, and pretending to himself that he has no selfish motivation for doing so.

There are a couple of customers ahead of Dan, but none behind him. When Dan’s at the front of the line, Phil lets himself take a moment to chat, his heart in his mouth.

“Hi,” he says, sounding a little breathless even to his own ears.

“Hey,” Dan replies, smiling. He sets his book on the counter - still reading Oscar Wilde - and Phil wonders if he ought to mention that he’d half-expected not to see him, when Dan beats him to it.

“It’s good to see you.”

“You too,” Phil says earnestly. He’s not sure he’s ever meant anything more. “Tea?”

“Please,” Dan nods, then pauses. He tilts his head to the side. “Do you have any flavoured ones?”

Phil ducks beneath the counter for a moment, coming back with a wooden box of flavoured teas. “Help yourself.”

Dan flashes him a smile, before dropping his attention to the box and the individually packaged teas within. Phil takes a moment, letting his eyes linger on the curls atop Dan’s bowed head, before he moves away to find a cup and boil some water. When he turns back around again, he finds Dan is watching him, seemingly lost in thought.

“Have you picked?” Phil asks, leaning back against the counter.

“No,” Dan says, eyes entirely focused on Phil’s hands as they set down his cup. “Busy.”

“Busy?”

“Mmm,” Dan shifts his gaze to meet Phil’s eyes. “I like watching you.”

Phil almost chokes on thin air at Dan’s blunt honesty. He doesn’t know how respond, or how to school his racing heart into beating out a regular rhythm again, or how to turn a blind eye to the heat that builds in the pit of his stomach. All he manages to convince his body to do is offer Dan a shy smile.

Hardly seeming to notice, Dan looks away; attention instantly consumed by the box of tea before him. “Anyway. Do you have some honey?”

“Yeah, we do.”

“I’ll have peppermint tea, then, please.”

Dan passes Phil a sachet, their fingers brushing so lightly that Phil wonders if he dreamt the contact entirely. He makes the tea in an almost-daze, still feeling the ghost of the warmth of Dan’s fingertips against his until he slides the cup in its saucer and a small jar of honey across the counter to Dan in exchange for a handful of coins.

As Phil passes back his change, Dan clears his throat. Phil looks up.

“You really need to get a tip jar,” Dan says.

“Making tea is hardly tip-worthy,” Phil answers lightly, but Dan frowns at his response.

“It is,” he tells him in earnest, picking up the tea and honey. “It is when you do it.”

 

 

* * *

 

A week passes like this, with an easy rhythm of small interactions and outwardly sparse conversations that say far more than they would appear to. The only exception is Phil’s day off, a day he spends mostly in bed, thinking, despite his half-hearted efforts not to, about a certain dark-haired boy. Otherwise, Dan turns up at the cafe each day without fail, and though his timing is irregular, he’s never later to the cafe than midday; ordering a tea - sometimes with a slice of cake, but always carrying a book.

Even so, there’s not been an evening like that first one. Dan tends to leave just before closing time, flashing Phil a bright smile and an almost-shy wave before he disappears beyond the dunes. It’s frustrating and a little worrying - Phil’s not sure why Dan won’t stay for longer, especially after that first night, and given that their every interaction since has felt like they’ve been building something inexplicably _good_ on that foundation.

The shift Phil’s been hoping for comes on an unsuspecting Tuesday, when Dan arrives just before the lunchtime rush and heads, as always, straight to the till.

As soon as he sees him, Phil smiles; setting about sitting a tray and cup and saucer out on the counter, already knowing what Dan will order.

“Do you get a break?” Dan asks in greeting, elbows resting against the countertop. Phil feels his eyes following him as he continues to move around, boiling some water and fetching the box of tea bags for Dan to look through.

“I do,” Phil replies, watching as Dan flicks through the sachets, before finally settling on an Earl Grey, which he passes to Phil to put in the tea pot. Drily, he adds: “Morning, by the way.”

Dan flashes him an almost-embarrassed, apologetic smile. “Morning, Phil. You wanna come grab me when you’re on that break?’

“Sure,” Phil says, managing to keep the question from his voice, and passing Dan his tea.

“I’ll be where I always am,” Dan tells him, and with what might just be a wink, turns away from Phil to walk out of the door.

 

* * *

 

It’s not until mid-afternoon, after the slowest two hours of his life, that Phil finally manages to take his break.

He finds Dan sat at his usual table just outside of the door, giving him a smile as he unties his apron and drapes it over the back of the free chair.

“Finished?” Dan asks, folding the corner of his page, and Phil nods.

“I’m all yours for half an hour,” he tells him, refusing to let his cheeks colour at the suggestiveness of his own words.

Dan just grins. “Walk with me?”

“I’d love to.”

 

* * *

 

He follows Dan to the beach, stepping carefully in an attempt to keep the sand out of his shoes, but it doesn’t take long for Phil to feel sand making its way into his socks and for him to toss his own caution aside.

“So,” Dan says, stopping when they reach the edge of the stretch of damp sand between the sea and the rest of the beach.

“So.” Phil halts beside him, expectant. He doesn’t know why this moment feels so weighted, but that it does is undeniable.

“How are you?”

The question surprises Phil; of all the things he’d thought Dan might ask, something so simple and surface-level didn’t seem likely.

“Not bad, I guess. Yourself?”

Dan shrugs, looking out towards the sea. “I’m not bad either.”

“That’s good,” Phil says. Something feels off today - with Dan, with this whole interaction - though he’s not sure if he should push it.

A quiet falls between them, broken only by the sound of the waves nearby. Phil joins Dan in looking out at the gently rolling sea, at its unappealing grey-blue colour that lightens on the rare occasions when the sun catches it just right.

“Do you want to talk?” Dan asks him gently, almost cautiously, though there’s something about his tone that says he already knows what his answer will be. Phil’s not sure how he knows just what to ask at just the right time - giving himself a moment to process Dan’s question, he realises he’s wanted to _talk_ since they started this, this _thing_ , whatever it is; wanted to be sure he’s not letting himself be pulled deeper by a current that has no intention of taking him to shore.

“I think I do,” Phil sighs. “I…"

He trails off, feeling almost guilty that he’s stalling for time to decide on his words, but a deep breath quashes that feeling. He’s sure Dan would rather hear him say what he means to than a half-formed thought spoken in haste.

“I just… we’re both on the same page here, right?” He asks, hoping that in being so vague he’s saying enough, because he knows there’s still every chance that he’s dangerously misread this; that Dan thinks of what’s between them as a fast-growing friendship, and nothing more.

“I’m not sure, Phil. The same page of what?” Dan blinks at him, his expression unreadable.

Phil already knows that, as ever, he’ll have to be the first to bite the bullet.

“Of this. Of what’s going on here. We know what this is.”

“I’m not sure I know,” Dan says, and whilst his tone gives nothing away, Phil wonders if there’s not a slight pull at the side of his mouth that hints at a smile. “Care to tell me?”

Phil sighs, wondering how to convey the meaning without having to say the words, because doing so would be throwing himself into the hands of a boy whose feelings he truly doesn’t know. Looking at Dan, though, at his dark eyes and the mass of wayward curls atop his head that Phil just aches to touch, he wonders if _not_ saying anything might somehow be worse.

“There’s… there’s something, right? Between us. This isn’t just me making more out of something than there is, or getting the wrong idea - because if it is, I- I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable or anything, but I also don’t want to keep tip-toeing around-”

“Phil,” Dan interrupts. “I like you.”

“-wait, what?” Phil’s stunned. “You do?”

Dan almost smirks. “You don’t?”

“Fuck,” Phil breathes, running a hand through his hair. To think he’d been so afraid of saying as much in far more words; he can barely respond. “Fuck.”

“You okay?” Dan laughs gently, reaching over to hold Phil’s shoulder with a grip that’s firm, unwavering. Phil stares down at his hand, at Dan’s long fingers and tanned skin, wondering at the warmth that seems to spread beneath his shirt wherever they touch.

Phil’s never felt anything like this. Already, overwhelmingly, he just wants _more._

“Yeah,” Phil nods, taking a few deep breaths as the words seem to finally find their way back to him. He smiles. “Yeah. I’m pretty okay.”  

“Good. Now, can we go back to the cafe?”

“I still have quarter of an hour on my break,” Phil frowns. “But sure?”

“Oh, I know," Dan laughs, brushing their shoulders together; their hands so close that Phil wonders if Dan might just link a finger or two with his. “But now we’ve cleared all that up, I feel like it’s time to hurry this all along.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning, barista,” Dan grins, “can I buy you a drink?”

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the final chapter of this part of the prequel. i still wanna write the whole prequel, and the successors to ‘love is the end’, but i’ve had such bad writer’s block for like six months now that i really don’t know if that’ll happen. anyway. at least this is done now. hope you enjoyed.
> 
> this chapter's title is yet Another xfiles reference, mayhaps the most subtle one yet. google it for a listen. ur welcome gays x


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